"Was it I who demanded the guillotining of my son-in-law? After all, it will be but justice; I will have returned him evil for evil. Is he not, truly speaking, the prime cause of my torments? After his death my daughter and wife will return to me. Everything will be for the best!"
CHAPTER XXXIII.
ARREST OF ROBESPIERRE.
Early the next morning the chiefs of the anti-Robespierre factions were in the Riding Hall of the Tuileries, where the sessions of the Convention were held. At about eight o'clock Tallien came in. As he walked to his seat on the crest of the Mountain, he passed along in front of the benches of the Right, greeting Durand-Maillane and his friends with an "Oh! what brave men are these of the Right!" Collot D'Herbois, that ex-comedian, thief and criminal, occupied the president's chair. St. Just, coming into the hall, went up to Robespierre, who appeared to give him some instructions. Couthon was carried to his seat between Robespierre the younger and Lebas by two ushers; he was paralyzed in both legs. These three citizens were counted among the purest, the most generous and energetic of the time. Long before the opening of the session the galleries were filled with people picked and stationed there by the enemies of Robespierre. The latter took his seat, an air of firm assurance dominating the preoccupation legible on his austere features. He knew not of the plot laid against him, and depended upon St. Just's speech to settle in his favor the question of accusation unhappily left undecided the night before. The chiefs of the allied factions exchanged signals of intelligence. Billaud-Varenne was speaking with one of the vice-presidents of the Convention, Thuriot, an irreproachable Terrorist. The whole aspect of the Assembly was foreboding. Suddenly the tinkling of Collot D'Herbois's bell sounded above the tumult of conversation, and the session was on.
Why follow the debate into all its bitterness and spite; why tell how again and again the plotters against the Republic raised their cries of "Down with the tyrant! Death to St. Just and Robespierre!"? Suffice it to say that the day ended in decrees of accusation against the Robespierres, elder and younger, St. Just, Lebas, and Couthon. An officer of the gendarmery was commissioned by the president to lead the accused to prison.
At five o'clock that afternoon, the 9th Thermidor, Madam Desmarais and her daughter, seated side by side in their parlor, pricked their ears at hearing the sound of the drum, mingled from time to time with the hurried and distant clanging of the tocsin.
"My God!" exclaimed Madam Desmarais, grief-stricken, "Again a 'day'—again a bloody struggle!"
"Reassure yourself, good mother; the wicked shall not triumph," Charlotte replied. "Robespierre is put under ban of arrest, but the Jacobins and the Sections will go to his rescue. The Commune has declared the country in danger, the tocsin calls the people to arms."
"Alas, I fear for your husband. He is at the City Hall as a member of the General Council. The Commune is in insurrection against the Convention; if the Commune loses, John will have become an outlaw."
"My husband will do his duty; the future belongs to God."
Suddenly Castillon entered the parlor, crying: "Good news! The Sections are taking arms and assembling to march to the Commune, with their cannon; the Jacobins have declared themselves in permanent session. Robespierre has been taken to the Luxembourg Prison; his brother to St. Lazare; St. Just to the Scotch Prison; Couthon to La Bourbe; and Lebas to the Chatelet. As I left the City Hall they were discussing the means of rescuing them."